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The pragmatics of NPP presidential campaign promises in Ghana’s 2008 elections


K Agyekum

Abstract

The paper discusses election campaign promises under Commissives, an aspect of Speech Act Theory, and Political Discourse Analysis (PDA). It considers the importance of context and looks at the social settings that are connected with promises. It examines the semantics, pragmatics and the structure of campaign promises. The paper focuses on the top two of the seventeen aspirants of the then ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) who ran the race for the presidential slot to contest in the 2008 general elections in Ghana. The paper finds that persuasion, rhetoric and commissives are used to influence voters (party delegates).

Keywords: campaign promises, commissives, Political Discourse Analysis (PDA), Media Discourse, persuasion, rhetoric.


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eISSN: 2458-746X
print ISSN: 0855-1502